In April 2014, Mike and Lia Noreen formed a Washington State Corporation, and have worked for a year and a half to become a commercial micro-brewery. Dealing with Federal, State and County regulations; applications, background checks and official forms has seemed like a never-ending line of hoops to jump through, but we did it. We have been approved to brew beer commercially!

With the help of mostly Lopez investors, we have completed the necessary improvements to the brewery building. At this point we are producing beer, we are probably the smallest nano-brewery in Washington. We are brewing with a 1/3-barrel brew system (10 gallons per brew-day), producing sixty, 22-ounce bottles per batch. We wish to increase our capacity to a 10-barrel brew system, which is 230-gallons, or 14 full size kegs, per brew.

We envision an island-owned brewing company, with a tasting room in Lopez Village; creating jobs for island residents, and producing enough beer for all the stores and restaurants on Lopez, as well as events such as Tour de Lopez, wedding receptions and fund raisers. After that, we’ll offer our product to the other San Juan Islands, and then the mainland with awesome beer, putting Lopez Island on the brewing map.